



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



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~Cr^. — 
Chap..!.-A-- Copyright No.___-. 

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



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THE riEi) riPEij OE n a:\ielix. 



THE BOYS' BROWNING 



POEMS OF ACTION AND INCIDENT 

COMPILED FOR THE USE OF 

YOUNG PEOPLE 



FROM THE WORKS OF 

ROBERT BROWNING 



IIlustratEU 




BOSTON 
DANA ESTES & COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



38320 



Copyright, i8gg 
By Dana Estes & Company 



f JUL 111899 } 

of Oo^-Ci^^ 



\^ 



s 



Colonial ^^ress 

Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co. 
Boston, Mass., U.S.A. 






CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

The Pied Piper ov Hamelin H 

Herve Riel 2'* 

Cavalier Tunes ^1 

"How They Brought the Good News from 

Ghent to Aix " 34 

Through the Metidja to Abd-el kadr ... 37 

Incident of the French Camp .... 39 

Clive 41 

MULl^YKEH ^9 

Tray 68 

A Tale 70 

Gold Hair 75 

Donald ^2 

The Glove 90 






LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PAGE 

The Pied Piper of Hamelin . . . Frontispiece 

'"Leave to go and see my wife, whom I call the 

Belle Aurore ' " . . . . . . .30 

" I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all 

three " . . . . . . . . .34 

"A rider bound on bound full galloping, nor 

bridle drew until he reached the mound " . 39 

" Hair, such a wonder of flix and floss " . .75 

" And full in the face of its owner flung the . 

GLOVE " 95 



THE BOYS' BROWNING. 



THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN. 

A child's story. 



I. 

Hamelin Town's in Brunswick, 
By famous Hanover city ; 

The river Weser, deep and wide, 

Washes its wall on the southern side ; 

A pleasanter spot you never spied ; 
But, when begins my ditty. 

Almost five hundred years ago. 

To see the townsfolk suffer so 
From vermin, was a pity. 

II. 

Rats! 
They fought the dogs and killed the cats. 

And bit the babies in the cradles. 
And ate the cheeses out of the vats, 

And licked the soup from the cooks' own 

ladles, 

11 



12 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Split open the kegs of salted sprats, 
Made nests inside men's Sunday hats, 
And even spoiled the women's chats 
By drowning their speaking 
With shrieking and squeaking 
In fifty different sharps and flats. 

III. 

At last the people in a body 

To the Town Hall came flocking : 
" 'Tis clear," cried they, " our Mayor's a 
noddy ; 
And as for our Corporation — shocking 
To think we buy gowns lined with ermine 
For dolts that can't or won't determine 
What's best to rid us of our vermin ! 
You hope, because you're old and obese. 
To find in the furry civic robe ease ? 
Rouse up, sirs ! Give your brains a racking 
To find the remedy we're lacking, 
Or, sure as fate, we'll send you packing ! " 
At this the Mayor and Corporation 
Quaked with a mighty consternation. 

IV. 

An hour they sat in council ; 

At length the Mayor broke silence : 
" For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell, 

I wish I were a mile hence ! 



THE PIED PIPER OF IIAMELIN. 13 

It's easy to bid one rack one's brain — 

I'm sure my poor head aches again, 

I've scratched it so, and all in vain. 

Oh, for a trap, a trap, a trap ! " 

Just as he said this, what -should hap 

At the chamber-door but a gentle tap ? 

" Bless us," cried the Mayor, " what's that ? " 

(With the Corporation as he sat, 

Looking little though wondrous fat ; 

Nor brighter was his eye, nor moister 

Than a too-long-opened oyster, 

Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous 

For a plate of turtle green and glutinous) 

" Only a scraping of shoes on the mat ? 

Anything like the sound of a rat 

Makes my heart go pit-a-pat ! " 

V. 

" Come in ! " — the Mayor cried, looking 

bigger : 
And in did come the strangest figure ! 
His queer long coat from heel to head 
Was half of yellow and half of red, 
And he himself was tall and thin, 
With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin. 
And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin, 
No tuft on cheek nor beard on chin. 
But lips where smiles went out and in ; 
There was no guessing his kith and kin : 



14 THE BOYS' BBOWNING. 

And nobody could enough admire 
The tall man and his quaint attire. 
Quoth one : " It's as my great-grandsire, 
Starting up at the Trump of Doom's tone, 
Had walked this way from his painted 
tombstone ! " 

VI. 

He advanced to the council-table : 

And, " Please your honours," said he, " I'm 

able. 
By means of a secret charm, to draw 
All creatures living beneath the sun. 
That creep or swim or fly or run. 
After me so as you never saw ! 
And I chiefly use my charm 
On creatures that do people harm. 
The mole and toad and newt and viper ; 
And people call me the Pied Piper." 
(And here they noticed round his neck 
A scarf of red and yellow stripe. 
To match with his coat of the self-same 

cheque ; 
And at the scarf's end hung a pipe ; 
And his fingers, they noticed, were ever 

straying 
As if impatient to be playing 
Upon this pipe, as low it dangled 
Over his vesture so old-fangled.) 



THE PIED PIPER OF 11 AM E LIN. 15 

" Yet," said he, " poor piper as I am. 
In Tartary I freed the Cham, 
Last June, from his huge swarms of gnats ; 
I eased in Asia the Nizam 
Of a monstrous brood of vampire-bats : 
And as for what your brain bewilders, 
If I can rid your town of rats 
Will you give me a thousand guilders ? " 
" One ? fifty thousand ! " — was the excla- 
mation 
Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation. 



VII. 

Into the street the Piper stept, 

Smiling first a little smile, 
As if he knew what magic slept 

In his quiet pipe the while ; 
Then, like a musical adept. 
To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled, 
And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled. 
Like a candle-flame where salt is sprinkled ; 
And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered. 
You heard as if an army muttered ; 
And the muttering grew to a grumbling ; 
A_nd the grumbling grew to a mighty rum- 
bling ; 
And out of the houses the rats came tum- 
bling. 



16 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats. 
Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats. 
Grave old plodders, gay young friskers. 

Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins. 
Cocking tails and pricking whiskers. 

Families by tens and dozens. 
Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives — 
Followed the Piper for their lives. 
From street to street he piped advancing. 
And step for step they followed dancing. 
Until they came to the river Weser, 
Wherein all plunged and perished ! 
— Save one who, stout as Julius Caesar, 
Swam across and lived to carry 
(As he, the manuscript he cherished) 
To Rat-land home his commentary : 
Which was, " At the first shrill notes of 

the pipe, 
I heard a sound as of scraping tripe. 
And putting apples, wondrous ripe. 
Into a cider-press's gripe : 
And a moving away of pickle-tub-boards. 
And a leaving ajar of conserve-cupboards, 
And a drawing the corks of train-oil-flasks. 
And a breaking the hoops of butter-casks : 
And it seemed as if a voice 
(Sweeter far than by harp or by psaltery 
Is breathed) called out, ' Oh, rats, rejoice ! 
The world is grown to one vast drysaltery ! 



THE PIED PIPER OF IIAMELIN. 17 

So mimch on, crunch on, take your nuncheon. 

Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon ! ' 

And just as a bulky sugar-puncheon, 

All ready staved, like a great sun shone 

Glorious scarce an inch before me, 

Just as methought it said, ' Come, bore me ! / 

— I found the Weser rolling o'er me." 

VIII. 

You should have heard the Hamelin people 
Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple. 
" Go," cried the Mayor, " and get long poles. 
Poke out the nests and block up the holes ! 
Consult with carpenters and builders. 
And leave in our town not even a trace 
Of the rats ! " — when suddenly, up the face 
Of the Piper perked in the market-place, 
With a, " First, if you please, my thousand 
guilders ! " 

IX. 

A thousand guilders ! The Mayor looked blue ; 
So did the Corporation, too. 
For council dinners made rare havoc 
With Claret, Moselle, Vin-de-Grave, Hock ; 
And half the money would replenish 
Their cellar's biggest butt with Rhenish. 
To pay this sum to a wandering fellow 
With a gypsy coat of red and yellow ! 



18 THE BOYS' BBOWNING. 

" Beside " quoth the Mayor with a knowing 

wink, 
" Our business was done at the river's brink ; 
We saw with our eyes the vermin sink, 
And what's dead can't come to life, I think. 
So, friend, we're not the folks to shrink 
From the duty of giving you something for drink. 
And a matter of money to put in your poke ; 
But as for the guilders, what we spoke 
Of them, as you very well know, was in joke. 
Beside, our losses have made us thrifty. 
A thousand guilders ! Come, take fifty ! " 

X. 

The Piper's face fell, and he cried, 

" No trifling ! I can't wait, beside ! 

I've promised to visit by dinner-time 

Bagdat, and accept the prime 

Of the Head-Cook's pottage, all he's rich in. 

For having left, in the Caliph's kitchen. 

Of a nest of scorpions no survivor : 

With him I proved no bargain-driver. 

With you, don't think I'll bate a stiver ! 

And folks who put me in a passion 

May find me pipe after another fashion." 

XI. 

" How ? " cried the Mayor, " d'ye think I brook 
Being worse treated than a Cook ? 



THE PIED PIPER OF IIAMELIN. 19 

Insulted by a lazy ribald 
With idle pipe and vesture piebald ? 
You threaten us, fellow ? Do your worst, 
Blow your pipe there till you burst ! " 

XII. 

Once more he stcpt into the street, 
And to his lips again 

Laid his long pipe of smooth straight cane ; 
And ere he blew three notes (such sweet 

Soft notes as yet musician's cunning 
Never gave the enraptured air) 

There was a rustling that seemed Hke a 
bustling 

Of merry crowds justling at pitching and 
hustling ; 

Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clat- 
tering, 

Little hands clapping and little tongues chat- 
tering, 

And, like fowls in a farmyard when barley 
is scattering. 

Out came the children running. 

All the little boys and girls. 

With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls, 

And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls. 

Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after 

The wonderful music with shouting and 
laughter. 



20 THE BOYS' BROWNING, 

XIII. 

The Mayor was dumb, and the Council stood 

As if they were changed into blocks of wood, 

Unable to move a step, or cry 

To the children merrily skipping by, 

— Could only follow with the eye 

That joyous crowd at the Piper's back. 

But how the Mayor was on the rack. 

And the wretched Council's bosoms beat. 

As the Piper turned from the High Street 

To where the Weser rolled its waters 

Right in the way of their sons and daughters ! 

However, he turned from South to West, 

And to Koppelberg Hill his steps addressed, 

And after him the children pressed ; 

Great was the joy in every breast. 

" He never can cross that mighty top ! 

He's forced to let the piping drop. 

And we shall see our children stop ! " 

When, lo, as they reached the mountainside, 

A wondrous portal opened wide, 

As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed ; 

And the Piper advanced and the children 

followed. 
And when all were in to the very last. 
The door in the mountainside shut fast. 
Hid I say, all ? No ! One was lame. 
And could not dance the whole of the way ; 



THE PIED PIPER OF IIAMELIN. 21 

And in after years, if you would blame 

His sadness, he was used to say, — 

" It's dull in our town since my playmates 

left! 
I can't forget that I'm bereft 
Of all the pleasant sights they see. 
Which the Piper also promised me. 
For he led us, he said, to a joyous land, 
Joining the town and just at hand, 
Where waters gushed and fruit-trees grew 
And flowers put forth a fairer hue. 
And everything was strange and new ; 
The sparrows were brighter than peacocks here, 
And their dogs outran our fallow deer. 
And honey-bees had lost their stings. 
And horses were born with eagles' wings : 
And just as I became assured 
My lame foot would be speedily cured, 
The music stopped and I stood still. 
And found myself outside the hill. 
Left alone against my will, 
To go now limping as before, 
And never hear of that country more ! " 

XIV. 

Alas, alas for Hamelin ! 

There came into many a burgher's pate 
A text which says that heaven's gate 
Opes to the rich at as easy rate 



22 rUE BOYS' BROWNING. 

As the needle's eye takes a camel in ! 
The Mayor sent East, West, North, and 

South, 
To offer the Piper, by word of mouth, 

Wherever it was men's lot to find him, 
Silver and gold to his heart's content, 
If he'd only return the way he went. 

And bring the children behind him. 
But when they saw 'twas a lost endeavour, 
And Piper and dancers were gone for ever, 
They made a decree that lawyers never 

Should think their records dated duly 
If, after the day of the month and year, 
These words did not as well appear, 
" And so long after what happened here 

On the Twenty-second of July, 
Thirteen hundred and seventy-six : " 
And the better in memory to fix 
The place of the children's last retreat, 
They called it, the Pied Piper's Street — 
Where any one playing on pipe or tabour 
Was sure for the future to lose his labour. 
Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern 

To shock with mirth a street so solemn ; 
But opposite the place of the cavern 

They wrote the story on a column, 
And on the great church-window painted 
The same, to make the world acquainted 
How their children were stolen away, 



THE riEB PIPER OF RAMELIN. 23 

And there it stands to this very day. 

And I must not omit to say 

That in Transylvania there's a tribe 

Of alien people who ascribe 

The outlandish ways and dress 

On which their neighbours lay such stress, 

To their fathers and mothers having risen 

Out of some subterraneous prison 

Into which they were trepanned 

Long time ago in a mighty band 

Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick land, 

But how or why, they don't understand. 

XV. 

So, Willy, let me and you be wipers 

Of scores out with all men — especially 

pipers ! 
And, whether they pipe us free from rats 

or from mice, 
If we've promised them aught, let us keep 
our promise ! 



24 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 



HERVB RIEL. 



I. 



On the sea and at the Hogue, sixteen hundred ninety- 
two, 
Did the English fight the French, — woe to France ! 
And, the thirty-first of May, helter-skelter through 

the blue, 
Like a crowd of frightened porpoises a shoal of sharks 
pursue. 
Came crowding ship on ship to Saint Malo on the 
Ranee, 
With the English fleet in view. 

II. 

'Twas the squadron that escaped, with the victor in 
full chase ; 
First and foremost of the drove, in his great ship, 
Damfreville ; 

Close on him fled, great and small, 
Twenty-two good ships in all ; 
And they signalled to the place 
" Help the winners of a race ! 

Get us guidance, give us harbour, take us quick — 

or, quicker still. 
Here's the English can and will ! " 



HERVE IIIEL. 25 

III. 

Then the pilots of the place put out brisk and leapt 
on board ; 
a Why, what hope or chance have ships like these 
to pass ? " laughed they : 
'' Rocks to starboard, rocks to port, all the passage 

scarred and scored. 
Shall the Formidable here with her twelve and eighty 
guns 
Think to make the river-mouth by the single nar- 
row way, 
Trust to enter where 'tis ticklish for a craft of twenty 
tons, 

And with flow at full beside ? 
Now, 'tis slackest ebb of tide. 
Reach the mooring ? Rather say, 
While rock stands or water runs, 
Not a ship will leave the bay ! " 

IV. 

Then was called a council straight. 

Brief and bitter the debate : 

" Here's the English at our heels ; would you have 

them take in tow 
AW that's left us of the fleet, linked together stern 

and bow. 
For a prize to Plymouth Sound ? 
Better run the ships aground ! " 
(Ended Damfreville his speech.) 



26 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

" Not a minute more to wait ! 

Let the Captains all and each 

Shove ashore, then blow up, burn the vessels on 
the beach ! 
France must undergo her fate. 

V. 

" Give the word ! " But no such word 

Was ever spoke or heard ; 

For up stood, for out stepped, for in struck amid all 

these 
— A Captain ? A Lieutenant ? A Mate — first, 
second, third ? 
No such man of mark, and meet 
With his betters to compete ! 

But a simple Breton sailor pressed by Tourville for 
the fleet, 
A poor coasting-pilot he, Herve Riel the Croisickese. 

VI. 

And " What mockery or malice have we here ? " cries 
Herve Riel : 
" Are you mad, you Malouins ? Are you cowards, 
fools, or rogues ? 
Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the 

soundings, tell 
On my fingers every bank, every shallow, every swell 
'Twixt the offing here and Greve where the river 
disembogues ? 



HEKV^ RIEL. 27 

Arc you bought by English gold ? Is it love the 
lying's for ? 

Morn and eve, night and day, 
Have I piloted your bay, 
Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of Solidor. 
Burn the fleet and ruin France ? That were worse 

than fifty Hogues ! 
Sirs, they know I speak the truth! Sirs, believe 
me there's a way ! 
Only let me lead the line, 

Have the biggest ship to steer. 
Get this Formidable clear. 
Make the others follow mine. 

And I lead them, most and least, by a passage I know 
well. 
Right to Solidor past Greve, 

And there lay them safe and sound ; 
And if one ship misbehave, 
— Keel so much as grate the ground. 
Why, I've nothing but my life, — here's my head ! " 
cries Herve Riel. 

VII. 

Not a minute more to wait. 

" Steer us in, then, small and great! 

Take the helm, lead the line, save the squadron ! " 
cried its chief. 
Captains, give the sailor place ! 

He is Admiral, in brief. 



28 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Still the north wind, by God's grace ! 
See the noble fellow's face 
As the big ship, with a bound. 
Clears the entry like a hound. 

Keeps the passage as its inch of way were the wide 
sea's profound ! 

See, safe through shoal and rock, 

How they follow in a flock. 
Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that grates the 
ground, 

Not a spar that comes to grief ! 
The peril, see, is past. 
All are harboured to the last. 
And just as Herve Riel hollas " Anchor ! " — sure as 

fate. 
Up the English come — too late ! 

VIII. 

So, the storm subsides to calm : 

They see the green trees wave 

On the heights o'erlooking Greve. 
Hearts that bled are stanched with balm. 
" Just our rapture to enhance, 

Let the English rake the bay. 
Gnash their teeth and glare askance 

As they cannonade away ! 
'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the Ranee I " 
How hope succeeds despair on each Captain's counte- 
nance ! 



HERV^ lilEL. 29 



Out burst all with one accord, 
'' This is Paradise for Hell ! 
Let France, let France's King- 
Thank the man that did the thino; ! " 



•& 



What a shout, and all one word, 

" Herv^ Kiel ! " 
As he stepped in front once more, 

Not a symptom of surprise 

In the frank blue Breton eyes, 
Just the same man as before. 

IX. 

Then said Damfreville, "• My friend, 
1 must speak out at the end. 

Though I find the speaking hard. 
Praise is deeper than the lips : 
You have saved the King his ships, 

You must name your own reward. 
'Faith, our sun was near eclipse ! 
Demand whate'er you will, 
France remains your debtor still. 

Ask to heart's content and have ! or my name's not 
Damfreville." 

X. 

Then a beam of fun outbroke 
On the bearded mouth that spoke, 
As the honest heart laughed through 
Those frank eyes of Breton blue : 
" Since I needs must say my say. 



30 THE BOYS' BB OWNING. 

Since on board the duty's done, 
And from Malo Roads to Croisic Point, what is it 
but a run ? — 
Since 'tis ask and have, I may — 

Since the others go ashore — 
Come ! A good whole holiday ! 

Leave to go and see my wife, whom I call the Belle 

Aurore ! " 
That he asked and that he got, — nothing more. 

XI. 

Name and deed alike are lost : 
Not a pillar nor a post 

In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell ; 
Not a head in white and black 
On a single fishing-smack, 
In memory of the man but for whom had gone to wrack 

All that France saved from the fight whence Eng- 
land bore the bell. 
Go to Paris : rank on rank 

Search the heroes flung pell-mell 
On the Louvre, face and flank ! 

You shall look long enough ere you come to Herv^ 
Kiel. 
So, for better and for worse, 
Ilerve Riel, accept my verse ! 
In my verse, Herve Riel, do thou once more 
Save the squadron, honour France, love thy wife the 
Belle Aurore ! 




LEAVE TO OC) AND SEE MY WIFE, AVIIOM I CALL THE 
BELLE AURORE.'" 



CAVALIER TUNES, 31 

CAVALIER TUNES. 

I. MARCHING ALONG. 

Kentish Sir Byng stood for his King, 

Bidding the crop-headed Parliament swing : 

And, pressing a troop unable to stoop 

And see the rogues flourish and honest folk droop, 

Marched them along, fifty-score strong. 

Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song. 

God for King Charles ! Pym and such carles 

To the Devil that prompts 'em their treasonous 

paries ! 
Cavaliers, up ! Lips from the cup. 
Hands from the pasty, nor bite take nor sup 
Till you're — 

Chorus. — Marching along, fifty-score strong, 

Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song. 

Hampden to hell, and his obsequies' knell. 
Serve Hazelrig, Fiennes, and young Harry as well ! 
England, good cheer ! Rupert is near ! 
Kentish and loyalists, keep we not here, 

Cho. — Marching along, fifty-score strong. 

Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song ? 



32 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Then, God for King Charles ! Pym and his snarls 
To the Devil that pricks on such pestilent carles ! 
Hold by the right, you double your might ; 
So, onward to Nottingham, fresh for the fight, 

Cho. — March we along, fifty-score strong, 

Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this song ! 



II. GIVE A ROUSE. 

King Charles, and who'll do him right now ? 
King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now ? 
Give a rouse : here's, in hell's despite now, 
King Charles ! 

Who gave me the goods that went since ? 
Who raised me the house that sank once ? 
Who helped me to gold I spent since ? 
Who found me in wine you drank once ? 

Cho. — King Charles, and who'll do him right now ? 
King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now ? 
Give a rouse : here's, in hell's despite now, 
King Charles ! 

To whom used my boy George quaff else, 
By the old fool's side that begot him ? 
For whom did he cheer and laugh else, 
While Noll's damned troopers shot him ? 



CAVALIER TUNES. 33 

Cho. — King Charles, and who'll do him right now ? 
King Charles, and who's ripe for fight now ? 
Give a rouse : here's, in hell's despite now, 
King Charles ! 

III. BOOT AND SADDLE. 

Boot, saddle, to horse, and away ! 
Rescue my castle before the hot day 
Brightens to blue from its silvery gray. 

Cho. — Boot, saddle, to horse, and away !" 

Ride past the suburbs, asleep as you'd say ; 

Many's the friend there, will listen and pray 

" God's luck to gallants that strike up the lay — 

Cho. — " Boot, saddle, to horse, and away ! " 

Forty miles off, like a roebuck at bay. 

Flouts Castle Brancepeth the Roundheads' array : 

Who laughs, " Good fellows ere this, by my fay, 

Cho. — " Boot, saddle, to horse, and away ! " 

Who ? My wife Gertrude ; that, honest and gay, 
Laughs when you talk of surrendering, " Nay ! 
I've better counsellors ; what counsel they ? 

Cho. — " Boot, saddle, to horse and away ! " 



34 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 



"HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS 
FROM GHENT TO AIX." 

I SPRANG to the stirrup, and Joris, and he ; 

I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three ; 

" Good speed ! " cried the watch, as the gate-bolts 

undrew ; 
" Speed ! " echoed the wall to us galloping through ; 
Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest, 
And into the midnight we galloped abreast. 

Not a word to each other ; we kept the great pace 
Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our 

place ; 
I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight. 
Then shortened each stirrup, and set the pique 

right, 
Rebuckled the cheek-strap, chained slacker the bit, 
Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit. 

'Twas moonset at starting ; but while we drew near 
Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight dawned clear ; 
At Boom, a great yellow star came out to see ; 
At Diiffeld, 'twas morning as plain as could be ; 
And from Mecheln church-steeple we heard the half- 
chime. 
So Joris broke silence with, " Yet there is time ! " 







9'} 



I CxALLOPED, DIKCK GALLOPED, WY. GALLOPED ALL 

THKEE." 



THE GOOD NEWS FROM GHENT. 35 

At Aershot, up leaped of a sudden the sun, 
And against him the cattle stood black every one, 
To stare through the mist at us galloping past. 
And I saw my stout galloper Roland at last, 
With resolute shoulders, each butting away 
The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray : 

And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear bent back 
For my voice, and the other pricked out on his track ; 
And one eye's black intelligence, — ever that glance 
O'er its white edge at me, his own master, askance ! 
And the thick heavy spume-flakes which aye and anon 
His fierce lips shook upwards in galloping on. 

By Hasselt, Dirck groaned ; and cried Joris, " Stay 

spur ! 
Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault's not in her, 
We'll remember at Aix " — for one heard the quick 

wheeze 
Of her chest, saw the stretched neck and staggering 

knees. 
And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank. 
As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank. 
So, we were left galloping, Joris and I, 
Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky ; 
The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh, 
'Neath our feet broke the brittle bright stubble like 

chaff; 



36 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang white, 
And " Gallop," gasped Joris, " for Aix is in sight ! " 

" How they'll greet us ! " and all in a moment his 

roan 
Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as a stone ; 
And there was my Roland to bear the whole weight 
Of the news which alone could save Aix from her 

fate, 
With his nostrils like pits full of blood to the brim, 
And with circles of red for his eye-sockets' rim. 

Then I cast loose my buff coat, each holster let fall. 
Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt and all, 
Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted his car. 
Called my Roland his pet-name, my horse without 

peer ; 
Clapped my hands, laughed and sang, any noise, bad 

or good. 
Till at length into Aix Roland galloped and stood. 

And all I remember is — friends flocking round 
As I sat with his head 'twixt my knees on the ground ; 
And no voice but was praising this Roland of mine, 
As I poured down his throat our last measure of wine, 
Which (the burgesses voted by common consent) 
Was no more than his due who brought good news 
from Ghent. 



THROUGH THE METIDJA TO ABD-EL-KADR. 37 



THROUGH THE METIDJA TO ABD-EL 

KADR. 

As I ride, as I ride, 

With a full heart for my guide, 

So its tide rocks my side, 

As I ride, as I ride. 

That, as I were double-eyed. 

He, in whom our Tribes confide, 

Is descried, ways untried. 

As I ride, as I ride. 

As I ride, as I ride 

To our Chief and his Allied, 

Who dares chide my heart's pride 

As I ride, as I ride ? 

Or are witnesses denied — 

Through the desert waste and wide 

Do I glide unespied 

As I ride, as 1 ride ? 

As I ride, as I ride. 

When an inner voice has cried, 

The sands slide, nor abide 

(As I ride, as I ride) 

O'er each visioned homicide 

That came vaunting (has he lied ?) 



38 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

To reside — where he died, 
As I ride, as I ride. 

As I ride, as I ride, 

Ne'er has spur my swift horse plied, 

Yet his hide, streaked and pied. 

As I ride, as I ride. 

Shows where sweat has sprung and dried, 

— Zebra-footed, ostrich -thighcd — 

How has vied stride with stride 

As I ride, as I ride ! 



As I ride, as 1 ride. 

Could I loose what Fate has tied. 

Ere I pried, she should hide 

(As I ride, as I ride) 

All that's meant me — satisfied 

When the Prophet and the Bride 

Stop veins I'd have subside 

As I ride, as I ride ! 



INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP. 39 



INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP. 

You know, wc French stormed Ratisbon : 

A mile or so away, 
On a little mound. Napoleon 

Stood on our storming-day ; 
With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, 

Legs wide, arms locked behind. 
As if to balance the prone brow, 

Oppressive with its mind. 

Just as perhaps he mused " My plans 

That soar, to earth may fall. 
Let once my army-leader, Lannes, 

Waver at yonder wall, — " 
Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew 

A rider, bound on bound 
Full-galloping ; nor bridle drew 

Until he reached the mound. 

Then off there flung in smiling joy, 

And held himself erect 
By just his horse's mane, a boy : 

You hardly could suspect — 
(So tight he kept his lips compressed, 

Scarce any blood came through) 
You looked twice ere you saw his breast 

Was all but shot in two. 



40 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

" Well," cried he, " Emperor, by God's grace 

We've got you Ratisbon ! 
The Marshal's in the market-place, 

And you'll be there anon 
To see your flag-bird flap his vans 

Where 1, to heart's desire. 
Perched him ! " The chief's eye flashed ; 
his plans 

Soared up again like fire. 

The chiefs eye flashed ; but presently 

Softened itself, as sheathes 
A film the mother-eagle's eye 

When her bruised eaglet breathes ; 
" You're wounded ! " " Nay," the soldier's 
pride 
Touched to the quick, he said : 
" I'm killed. Sire ! " and his chief beside, 
Smiling the boy fell dead. 







*:^i 



"A EIDER, BOUND ON BOUND FULL-GALLOPING; NOK 
BRIDLE DREW UNTIL HE REACHED THE MOUND." 



CLIVE. 41 



CLIVE. 

I AND Clive were friends — and why not ? Friends ! 

I think you laugh, my lad. 
Clive it was gave England India, while your father 

gives — egad, 
England nothing but the graceless boy who lures him 

on to speak — 
" Well, Sir, you and Clive were comrades — " with a 

tongue thrust in your cheek ! 
Very true : in my eyes, your eyes, all the world's eyes, 

Clive was man, 
I was, am, and ever shall be — mouse, nay, mouse of 

all its clan 
Sorriest sample, if you take the kitchen's estimate for 

fame ; 
While the man Clive — he fought Plassy, spoiled the 

clever foreign game, 
Conquered and annexed and Englished ! 

Never mind ! As o'er my punch 
(You away) I sit of evenings, — silence, save for bis- 
cuit crunch. 
Black, unbroken, — thought grows busy, thrids each 

pathway of old years. 
Notes this forthright, that meander, till the long past 
life appears 



42 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Like an outspread map of country plodded through, 

each mile and rood, 
Once, and well remembered still, — I'm startled in 

my solitude 
Ever and anon by — what's the sudden mocking light 

that breaks 
On me as I slap the table till no rummer-glass but shakes 
While I ask — aloud, I do believe, God help me ! — 

" Was it thus ? 
Can it be that so I faltered, stopped when just one 

step for us — " 
(Us, — you were not born, I grant, but surely some 

day born would be) 
" — One bold step had gained a province " (figurative 

talk, you see) 
" Got no end of wealth and honour, — yet I stood 

stock-still no less ? " 
— " For I was not Olive," you comment : but it needs 

no Olive to guess 
Wealth were handy, honour ticklish, did no writing on 

the wall 
Warn me " Trespasser, 'ware man-traps ! " Him who 

braves that notice — call 
Hero ! None of such heroics suit myself who read 

plain words. 
Doff my hat, and leap no barrier. Scripture says, the 

land's the Lord's : 
Louts then — what avail the thousand, noisy in a 

smock-frocked ring. 



CLIVE. 43 

All-agog to have me trespass, clear the fence, be Clive 

their king ? 
Higher warrant must you show me ere I set one foot 

before 
T'other in that dark direction, though I stand for ever- 
more 
Poor as Job and meek as Moses. Evermore ? No ! 

By and by 
Job grows rich and Moses valiant, Clive turns out less 

wise than I. 
Don't object " Why call him friend, then ? " Power 

is power, my boy, and still 
Marks a man,— God's gift magnific, exercised for 

good or ill. 
You've your boot now on my hearth-rug, tread what 

was a tiger's skin ; 
Rarely such a royal monster as I lodged the bullet 

in! 
True, he murdered half a village, so his own death 

came to pass ; 
Still, for size and beauty, cunning, courage — ah, the 

brute he was ! 
Why, that Clive, — that youth, that greenhorn, that 

quill-driving clerk, in fine, — 
-He sustained a siege in Arcot . . . But the world 

knows ! Pass the wine. 

Where did I break off at ? How bring Clive in ? Oh, 
you mentioned " fear ! " 



44 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Just SO : and, said I, that minds me of a story you 
shall hear. 

We were friends then, Clive and I : so, when the 
clouds, about the orb 

Late supreme, encroaching slowly, surely threaten to 
absorb 

Ray by ray its noontide brilliance, — friendship might, 
with steadier eye 

Drawing near, bear what had burned else, now no 
blaze — all majesty. 

Too much bee's-wing floats my figure? Well, sup- 
pose a castle's new : 

None presume to climb its ramparts, none find foot- 
hold sure for shoe 

'Twixt those squares and squares of granite plating 
the impervious pile 

As his scale-mail's warty iron cuirasses a croco- 
dile. 

Reels that castle thunder-smitten, storm-dismantled ? 
From without 

Scrambling up by crack and crevice, every cockney 
prates about 

Towers — the heap he kicks now ! Turrets — just 
the measure of his cane ! 

Will that do ? Observe moreover — (same similitude 
again) — 

Such a castle seldom crumbles by sheer stress of 
cannonade : 



CLIVK 45 

'Tis when foes are foiled, and fighting's finished that 
vile rains invade, 

Grass o'ergrows, o'ergrows till night-birds congregat- 
ing find no holes 

Fit to build like the topmost sockets made for banner- 
poles. 

So Clive crumbled slow in London, crashed at last. 

A week before, 
Dining with him, — after trying churchyard chat of 

days of yore, — 
Both of us stopped, tired as tombstones, head-piece, 

foot-piece, when they lean 
Each to other, drowsed in fog-smoke, o'er a coffined 

Past between. 
As I saw his head sink heavy, guessed the soul's ex- 
tinguishment 
By the glazing eyeball, noticed how the furtive fingers 

went 
Where a drug-box skulked behind the honest liquor, 

— " One more throw 
Try for Clive ! " thought I : " Let's venture some good 

rattling question ! " So — 
" Come Clive, tell us " — out I blurted — " what to 

tell in turn, years hence, 
When my boy — suppose I have one — asks me on 

what evidence 
I maintain my friend of Plassy proved a warrior every 

whit 



46 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Worth your Alexanders, Caesars, Marlboroughs, and 

— what said Pitt ? — 

Frederick the Fierce himself! Clive told me once" 

— I want to say — 

" Which feat out of all those famous doings bore the 
bell away 

— In his own calm estimation, mark you, not the 
mob's rough guess — 

Which stood foremost as evincing what Clive called 
courageousness ! 

Come ! What moment of the minute, what speck- 
centre in the wide 

Circle of the action saw your mortal fairly deified ? 

(Let alone that filthy sleep-stuff, swallow bold this 
wholesome Port !) 

If a friend has leave to question, — when were you 
most brave, in short ? " 



Up he arched his brows o' the instant — formidably 
Clive again. 

" When was I most brave ? I'd answer, were the in- 
stance half as plain 

As another instance that's a brain-lodged crystal — 
curse it ! — here 

Freezing when my memory touches — ugh ! — the time 
I felt most fear. 

Ugh ! I cannot say for certain if I showed fear — any- 
how, 



CLIVE. 47 

Fear I felt, and, very likely, shuddered, since I shiver 
now." 

" Fear ! " smiled I. " Well, that's the rarer : that's a 

specimen to seek. 
Ticket up in one's museum, Mind-Freaks, Lord Clivers 

Fear, Unique /^^ 

Down his brows dropped. On the table painfully he 
pored as though 

Tracing, in the stains and streaks there, thoughts en- 
crusted long ago. 

When he spoke 'twas like a lawyer reading word by 
word some will. 

Some blind jungle of a statement, — beating on and 
on until 

Out there leaps fierce life to fight with. 

" This fell in my factor-days. 
Desk-drudge, slaving at Saint David's, one must game, 

or drink, or craze. 
I chose gaming: and, — because your high-flown 

gamesters hardly take 
Umbrage at a factor's elbow, if the factor pays his 

stake, — 
I was winked at in a circle where the company was 

choice. 
Captain This and Major That, men high of colour, loud 

of voice. 



48 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Yet indulgent, condescending to the modest juvenile 
Who not merely risked, but lost his hard-earned 
guineas with a smile. 

" Down I sat to cards, one evening, — had for my 

antagonist 
Somebody whose name's a secret — you'll know why 

— so, if you list, 
Call him Cock o' the Walk, my scarlet son of Mars 

from head to heel ! 
Play commenced : and, whether Cocky fancied that a 

clerk must feel 
Quite sufficient honour came of bending over one green 

baize, 
I the scribe with him the warrior, guessed no penman 

dared to raise 
Shadow of objection should the honour stay but play- 
ing end 
More or less abruptly, — whether disinclined he grew 

to spend 
Practice strictly scientific on a booby born to stare 
At — not ask of — lace-and-ruffles if the hand they 

hide plays fair, — 
Anyhow, I marked a movement when he bade me 

' Cut ! ' 

" I rose. 
' Such the new manoeuvre. Captain ? I'm a novice : 

knowledge grows. 
What, you force a card, you cheat. Sir ? ' 



CLIVE. 49 

" Never did a thunder-clap 
Cause emotion, startle Thyrsis locked with Chloe in 

his lap, 
As my word and gesture (down I flung my cards to 

join the pack) 
Fired the man of arms, whose visage, simply red 

before, turned black. 

" When he found his voice, he stammered ' That ex- 
pression once again ! ' 

" ' Well, you forced a card and cheated ! ' 

" ' Possibly a factor's brain, 
Busied with his all-important balance of accounts, 

may deem 
Weighing words superfluous trouble : cheat to clerkly 

ears may seem 
Just the joke for friends to venture : but we are not 

friends, you see ! 
When a gentleman is joked with, — if he's good at 

repartee. 
He rejoins, as do I — Sirrah, on your knees, withdraw 

in full ! 
Beg my pardon, or be sure a kindly bullet through 

your skull 
Lets in light and teaches manner to what brain it 

finds ! Choose quick — 
Have your life snuffed out or, kneeling, pray me trim 

yon candle-wick ! ' 



50 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

" ' Well, you cheated ! ' 

" Then outbroke a howl from all the friends around. 
To his feet sprang each in fury, fists were clenched 

and teeth were ground. 
'End it! no time like the present! Captain, yours 

were our disgrace ! 
No delay, begin and finish ! Stand back, leave the 

pair a space ! 
Let civilians be instructed : henceforth simply ply the 

pen, 
Fly the sword ! This clerk's no swordsman ? Suit 

him with a pistol, then ! 
Even odds ! A dozen paces 'twixt the most and least 

expert 
Make a dwarf a giant's equal : nay, the dwarf, if he's 

alert. 
Likelier hits the broader target ! ' 

V " Up we stood accordingly. 
As they handed me the weapon, such was my soul's 

thirst to try 
Then and there conclusions with this bully, tread on 

and stamp out 
Every spark of his existence, that, — crept close to, 

curled about 
By that toying, tempting, teasing, fool-forefinger's 

middle joint, — 



CLIVE. 51 

Don't you guess ? — the trigger yielded. Gone my 

chance ! and at the point 
Of such prime success moreover : scarce an inch 

above his head 
Went my ball to hit the wainscot. He was living, 1 

was dead. 

" Up he marched in flaming triumph — 'twas his 
right, mind ! — up, within 

Just an arm's length. ' Now, my clerkling,' chuckled 
Cocky, with a grin 

As the levelled piece quite touched me, ' Now, Sir 
Counting-House, repeat 

That expression which I told you proved bad man- 
ners ! Did I cheat ? ' 

" ' Cheat you did, you knew you cheated, and, this 

moment, know as well. 
As for me, my homely breeding bids you — fire and 

go to Hell ! ' 

"Tvdce the muzzle touched my forehead. Heavy 

barrel, flurried wrist. 
Either spoils a steady lifting. Thrice : then, ' Laugh 

at Hell who list, 
I can't! God's no fable either. Did this boy's eye 

wink once ? No ! 
There's no standing him and Hell and God all three 

against me, — so, 
I did cheat!' 



52 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

" And down he threw the pistol, out rushed — by the 
door 

Possibly, but, as for knowledge if by chimney, roof or 
floor, 

He effected disappearance — I'll engage no glance was 
sent 

That way by a single starer, such a blank astonish- 
ment 

Swallowed up their senses : as for speaking — mute 
they stood as mice. 

" Mute not long, though ! Such reaction, such a 

hubbub in a trice ! 
' Rogue and rascal ! Who'd have thought it ? What's 

to be expected next. 
When His Majesty's Commission serves a sharper as 

pretext 
For . . . But where's the need of wasting time now ? 

Naught requires delay : 
Punishment the Service cries for: let disgrace be 

wiped away 
Publicly, in good broad daylight ! Resignation ? No, 

indeed ! 
Drum and fife must play the Rogue's-March, rank and 

file be free to speed 
Tardy marching on the rogue's part by appliance in 

the rear 
— Kicks administered shall right this wronged civil- 
ian, — never fear, 



CLIVE. 53 

Mister Clive, for — though a clerk — you bore yourself 

— suppose we say — 
Just as would beseem a soldier ? 



" ' Gentlemen, attention — pray ! 
First, one word ! ' 

" I passed each speaker severally in review. 
When I had precise their number, names, and styles, 

and fully knew 
Over whom my supervision thenceforth must extend, 
— why, then — 

" ' Some five minutes since, my life lay — as you all 

saw, gentlemen — 
At the mercy of your friend there. Not a single 

voice was raised 
In arrest of judgment, not one tongue — before my 

powder blazed — 
Ventured ^' Can it be the youngster plundered, really 

seemed to mark 
Some irregular proceeding ? We conjecture in the 

dark, 
Guess at random, — still, for sake of fair play — 

what if for a freak. 
In a fit of absence, — such things have been ! — if our 

friend proved weak 
— What's the phrase? — corrected fortune! Look 

into the case, at least ! " 



54 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Who dared interpose between the altar's victim and 

the priest ? 
Yet he spared me ! You eleven ! Whosoever, all or 

each, 
To the disadvantage of the man who spared me, 

utters speech 
— To his face, behind his back, — that speaker has 

to do with me : 
Me who promise, if positions change, and mine the 

chance should be. 
Not to imitate your friend and waive advantage ! ' 

" Twenty-five 
Years ago this matter happened: and 'tis certain," 

added Clive, 
"Never, to my knowledge, did Sir Cocky have a 

single breath 
Breathed against him : lips were closed throughout 

his life, or since his death. 
For if he be dead or living I can tell no more than 

you. 
All I know is — Cocky had one chance more ; how he 

used it, — grew 
Out of such unlucky habits, or relapsed, and back 

again 
Brought the late-ejected devil with a score more in 

his train, — 
That's for you to judge. Reprieval I procured, at any 

rate. 



CLIVE. 55 

Ugh — the memory of that minute's fear makes 

gooseflesh rise ! Why prate 
Longer ? You've my story, there's your instance : 

fear I did, you see ! " 

" Well " — I hardly kept from laughing — "if I see 

it, thanks must be 
Wholly to your Lordship's candour. Not that — in 

a common case — 
When a bully caught at cheating thrusts a pistol in 

one's face, 
I should under-rate, believe me, such a trial to the 



nerve 



'Tis no joke, at one-and-twenty, for a youth to stand 

nor swerve. 
Fear I naturally look for — unless, of all men alive, 
I am forced to make exception when I come to Robert 

Clive. 
Since at Arcot, Plassy, elsewhere, he and death — 

the whole world knows — 
Came to somewhat closer quarters." 

Quarters ? Had we come to blows, 
Clive and I, you had not wondered — up he sprang 

so, out he rapped 
Such a round of oaths — no matter ! I'll endeavour to 

adapt 
To our modern usage words he — well, 'twas friendly 

license — flung 



56 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

At me like so many fire-balls, fast as he could wag 
his tongue. 

" You — a soldier ? You — at Plassy ? Yours the 
faculty to nick 

Instantaneously occasion when your foe, if lightning- 
quick, 

— At his mercy, at his malice, — has you, through 

some stupid inch 
Undefended in your bulwark ? Thus laid open, — not 
to flinch 

— That needs courage, you'll concede me. Then, 

look here ! Suppose the man. 
Checking his advance, his weapon still extended, not 

a span 
Distant from my temple, — curse him ! — quietly had 

bade me, ' There ! 
Keep your life, calumniator ! — worthless life I freely 

spare : 
Mine you freely would have taken — murdered me 

and my good fame 
Both at once — and all the better ! Go, and thank 

your own bad aim 
Which permits me to forgive you ! ' What if, with 

such words as these, 
He had cast away his weapon ? How should I have 

borne me, please ? 
Nay, I'll spare you pains and tell you. This, and only 

this, remained — 



CLIVE. 57 

Pick his weapon up and use it on myself. If so had 
gained 

Sleep the earlier, leaving England probably to pay on 
still 

Rent and taxes for half India, tenant at the French- 
man's will." 

" Such the turn," said I, " the matter takes with you ? 
Then I abate 

— No, by not one jot nor tittle, — of your act my 

estimate. 
Fear — I wish I could detect there : courage fronts me, 

plain enough — 
Call it desperation, madness — never mind ! for here's 

in rough 
Why, had mine been such a trial, fear had overcome 

disgrace. 
True, disgrace were hard to bear : but such a rush 

against God's face 

— None of that for me. Lord Plassy, since I go to 

church at times. 
Say the creed my mother taught me ! Many years in 

foreign climes 
Rub some marks away — not all, though! We poor 

sinners reach life's brink, 
Overlook what rolls beneath it, recklessly enough, but 

think 
There's advantage in what's left us — ground to stand 

on, time to call 



58 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

' Lord, have mercy ! ' ere we topple over — do not 
leap, that's all ! " 

Oh, he made no answer, re-absorbed into his cloud. 

I caught 
Something like " Yes — courage : only fools will call 

it fear." 

If aught 
Comfort you, my great unhappy hero Clive, in that 

I heard. 
Next week, how your own hand dealt you doom, and 

uttered just the word 
" Fearfully courageous ! " — this, be sure, and nothing 

else I groaned. 
I'm no Clive, nor parson either : Clive's worst deed — 

we'll hope condoned. 



MULEYKEU. 59 



MULEYKEH. 

If a stranger passed the tent of Hoseyn, he cried 

" A churl's ! " 
Or haply " God help the man who has neither salt nor 

bread ! " 

— "Nay," would a friend exclaim, "he needs nor 

pity nor scorn 
More than who spends small thought on the shore- 
sand, picking pearls, 

— Holds but in light esteem the seed-sort, bears 

instead 
On his breast a moon-like prize, some orb which of 
night makes morn. 

" What if no flocks and herds enrich the son of 

Sinan ? 
They went when his tribe was mulct, ten thousand 

camels the due. 
Blood-value paid perforce for a murder done of old. 
' God gave them, let them go ! But never since time 

began, 
Muleykeh, peerless mare, owned master the match of 

you. 
And you are my prize, my Pearl : I laugh at men's 

land and gold ! ' 



f)0 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

" So in the pride of his soul laughs H6seyn — and 

right, I say. 
Do the ten steeds run a race of glory ? Outstripping 

all, 
Ever Muleykeh stands first steed at the victor's staff. 
Who started, the owner's hope, gets shamed and 

named, that day. 
' Silence,' or, last but one, is ' The Cuffed,' as we used 

to call 
Whom the paddock's lord thrusts forth. Right, H6- 

seyn, I say, to laugh ! " 

" Boasts he Muleykeh the Pearl ? " the stranger replies : 

" Be sure 
On him I waste nor scorn nor pity, but lavish both 
On Duhl the son of Sheyban, who withers away in heart 
For envy of Hoseyn's luck. Such sickness admits no 

cure. 
A certain poet has sung, and sealed the same with an 

oath, 
' For the vulgar — flocks and herds ! The Pearl is a 

prize apart.' " 

Lo, Duhl the son of Sheyban comes riding to H6seyn's 

tent. 
And he casts his saddle down, and enters and " Peace ! " 

bids he. 
" You are poor, I know the cause : my plenty shall 

mend the wrong. 



MULj^YKEIL 61 

'Tis said of your Pearl — the price of a hundred cam- 
els spent 
In her purchase were scarce ill paid : such prudence 

is far from me 
Who proffer a thousand. Speak ! Long parley may 
last too long." 

Said Hoseyn, " You feed young beasts a many, of fa- 
mous breed, 

Slit-eared, unblemished, fat, true offspring of Muzen- 
nem : 

There stumbles no weak-eyed she in the line as it 
climbs the hill. 

But I love Muleykeh's face: her forefront whitens 
indeed 

Like a yellowish wave's cream-crest. Your camels — 
go gaze on them ! 

Her fetlock is foam-splashed too. Myself am the 
richer still." 

A year goes by : lo, back to the tent again rides Duhl. 
"You are open-hearted, ay — moist-handed, a very 

prince. 
Why should I speak of sale ? Be the mare your 

simple gift ! 
My son is pined to death for her beauty : my wife 

prompts ' Fool, 
Beg for his sake the Pearl ! Be God the rewarder, 

since 



62 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

God pays debts seven for one : who squanders on Him 
shows thrift.' " 



Said H6seyn, " God gives each man one life, like a 
lamp, then gives 

That lamp due measure of oil : lamp lighted — hold 
high, wave wide 

Its comfort for others to share ! once quench it, what 
help is left ? 

The oil of your lamp is your son : I shine while Muley- 
keh lives. 

Would I beg your son to cheer my dark if Mul^ykeh 
died? 

It is life against life : what good avails to the life- 
bereft?" 

Another year, and — hist ! What craft is it Duhl 
designs ? 

He alights not at the door of the tent as he did last 
time. 

But, creeping behind, he gropes his stealthy way by 
the trench 

Half-round till he finds the flap in the folding, for 
night combines 

With the robber — and such is he: Duhl, covetous 
up to crime, 

Must wring from Hdseyn's grasp the Pearl, by what- 
ever the wrench. 



MUL^YKEH. 63 

" He was hunger-bitten, I heard : I tempted with half 

my store, 
And a gibe was all my thanks. Is he generous like 

Spring dew ? 
Account the fault to me who chaffered with such an 

one ! 
He has killed, to feast chance comers, the creature he 

rode : nay, more — 
For a couple of singing-girls his robe has he torn in 

two : 
I will beg ! Yet I nowise gained by the tale of my 

wife and son. 

" I swear by the Holy House, my head will I never 

wash 
Till I filch his Pearl away. Fair dealing I tried, then 

guile. 
And now I resort to force. He said we must live or 

die : 
Let him die, then, — let me live ! Be bold — but not 

too rash ! 
I have found me a peeping-place : breast, bury your 

breathing while 
I explore for myself ! Now, breathe ! He deceived 

me not, the spy ! 

" As he said — there lies in peace Hoseyn — how 
happy ! Beside 



64 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Stands tethered the Pearl : thrice winds her headstall 
about his wrist : 

'Tis therefore he sleeps so sound — the moon through 
the roof reveals. 

And, loose on his left, stands too that other, known 
far and wide, 

Buheyseh, her sister born : fleet is she yet ever missed 

The winning tail's fire-flash a-stream past the thunder- 
ous heels. 

" No less she stands saddled and bridled, this second, 
in case some thief 

Should enter and seize and fly with the first, as I 
mean to do. 

What then ? The Pearl is the Pearl : once mount 
her we both escape." 

Through the skirt-fold in glides Duhl, — so a serpent 
disturbs no leaf 

In a bush as he parts the twigs entwining a nest: 
clean through. 

He is noiselessly at his work : as he planned, he per- 
forms the rape. 

He has set the tent-door wide, has buckled the girth, 

has clipped 
The headstall away from the wrist he leaves thrice 

bound as before. 
He springs on the Pearl, is launched on the desert 

like bolt from bow. 



MULEYKEH. Qb 

Up starts our plundered man : from his breast though 

the heart be ripped, 
Yet his mind has the mastery : behold, in a minute 

more, ~ 

He is out and off and away on Buheyseh, whose worth 

we know ! 

And Hoseyn^— his blood turns flame, he has learned 

long since to ride. 
And Buheyseh does her part, — they gain — they are 

gaining fast 
On the fugitive pair, and Duhl has Ed-Darraj to cross 

and quit. 
And to reach the ridge El-Saban, — no safety till that 

he spied ! 
And Buheyseh is, bound by bound, but a horse-length 

off at last. 
For the Pearl has missed the tap of the heel, the 

touch of the bit. 

She shortens her stride, she chafes at her rider the 

strange and queer : 
Buheyseh is mad with hope — beat sister she shall 

and must. 
Though Duhl, of the hand and heel so clumsy, she has 

to thank. 
She is near now, nose by tail — they are neck by 

croup — joy ! fear ! 



QQ THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

What folly makes Hoseyn shout " Dog Duhl, Damned 

son of the Dust, 
Touch the right ear and press with your foot my 

Pearl's left flank ! " 

And Duhl was wise at the word, and Muleykeh as 
prompt perceived 

Who was urging redoubled pace, and to hear him was 
to obey, 

And a leap indeed gave she, and evanished for ever- 
more. 

And Hoseyn looked one long last look as who, all 
bereaved, 

Looks, fain to follow the dead so far as the living 
may : 

Then he turned Buheyseh's neck slow homeward, 
weeping sore. 

And, lo, in the sunrise, still sat H6seyn upon the 

ground 
Weeping : and neighbours came, the tribesmen of Benu- 

Asiid 
In the vale of green Er-Rass, and they questioned him 

of his grief ; 
And he told from first to last how, serpeni>like, Duhl 

had wound 
His way to the nest, and how Duhl rode like an ape, 

so bad ! 



MULlilYKFAI. 67 

And how Buheyseh did wonders, yet Pearl remained 
with the thief. 

And they jeered him, one and all : " Poor Hoseyn is 

crazed past hope ! 
How else had he wrought himself his ruin, in fortune's 

spite ? 
To have simply held the tongue were a task for boy 

or girl. 
And here were Muleykeh again, the eyed like an 

antelope. 
The child of his heart by day, the wife of his breast 

by night ! " — 
" And the beaten in speed ! " wept Hoseyn. " You 

never have loved my Pearl." 



68 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 



TRAY. 

Sing me a hero ! Quench my thirst 
Of soul, ye bards ! 

Quoth Bard the first : 
" Sir Olaf, the good knight, did don 
His hehn and eke his habergeon "... 
Sir Olaf and his bard — ! 

" That sin-scathed brow " (quoth Bard the 

second), 
" That eye wide ope as though Fate beckoned 
My hero to some steep, beneath 
Which precipice smiled tempting death "... 
You too without your host have reckoned ! 

" A beggar-child " (let's hear this third !) 
" Sat on a quay's edge : like a bird 
Sang to herself at careless play, 
And fell into the stream. ' Dismay ! 
Help, you the standers-by ! ' None stirred. 

" Bystanders reason, think of wives 
And children ere they risk their lives. 
Over the balustrade has bounced 
A mere instinctive dog, and pounced 
Plumb on the prize. ' How well he dives ! 



TBAY. 69 

" ' Up he comes with the child, see, tight 
In mouth, alive too, clutched from quite 
A depth of ten feet — twelve, I bet ! 
Good dog ! What, off again ? There's yet 
Another child to save ? All right ! 

" ' How strange we saw no other fall ! 
It's instinct in the animal. 
Good dog ! But he's a long while under : 
If he got drowned I should not wonder — 
Strong current, that against the wall ! 

" ' Here he comes, holds in mouth this time 

— What may the thing be ? Well, that's prime ! 

Now, did you ever ? Reason reigns 

In man alone, since all Tray's pains 

Have fished — the child's doll from the slime ! ' 

" And so, amid the laughter gay. 
Trotted my hero off, — old Tray, — 
Till somebody, prerogatived 
With reason, reasoned : ' Why he dived, 
His brain would show us, I should say. 

" ' John, go and catch — or, if needs be. 

Purchase — that animal for me ! 

By vivisection, at expense 

Of half-an-hour and eighteenpence. 

How brain secretes dog's soul, we'll see ' ' " 



70 THE BOYS' BBOWNING. 



A TALE. 



What a pretty tale you told me 
Once upon a time 

— Said you found it somewhere (scold me !) 
Was it prose or was it rhyme, 

Greek or Latin ? Greek, you said, 
While your shoulder propped my head. 

Anyhow there's no forgetting 

This much if no more. 
That a poet (pray, no petting !) 

Yes, a bard, sir, famed of yore, 
Went where suchlike used to go, 
Singing for a prize, you know. 

Well, he had to sing, nor merely 

Sing but play the lyre ; 
Playing was important clearly 

Quite as singing : I desire. 
Sir, you keep the fact in mind 
For a purpose that's behind. 

There stood he, while deep attention 
Held the judges round, 

— Judges able, I should mention. 
To detect the slightest sound 

Sung or played amiss : such ears 
Had old judges, it appears ! 



A TALE. 71 

None the less he sang out boldly, 

Played in time and tune, 
Till the judges, weighing coldly 

Each note's worth, seemed, late or soon, 
Sure to smile " In vain one tries 
Picking faults out : take the prize ! " 

When, a mischief ! Were they seven 

Strings the lyre possessed ? 
Oh, and afterwards eleven. 

Thank you ! Well, sir, — who had 
guessed 
Such ill luck in store ? — it happed 
One of those same seven strings snapped. 

All was lost, then ! No ! a cricket 

(What " cicada ? " Pooh !) 
— Some mad thing that left its thicket 

For mere love of music — flew 
With its little heart on fire. 
Lighted on the crippled lyre. 

So that when (Ah, joy !) our singer 

For his truant string 
Feels with disconcerted finger, 

What does cricket else but fling 
Fiery heart forth, sound the note 
Wanted by the throbbing throat ? 



72 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Ay, and ever to the ending, 

Cricket chirps at need, 
Executes the hand's intending, 

Promptly, perfectly, — indeed 
Saves the singer from defeat 
With her chirrup low and sweet. 

Till, at ending, all the judges 

Cry with one assent 
" Take the prize — a prize who grudges 

Such a voice and instrument ? 
Why, we took your lyre for harp, 
So it shrilled us forth F sharp ! " 

Did the conqueror spurn the creature. 

Once its service done ? 
That's no such uncommon feature 

In the case when Music's son 
Finds his Lotto's power too spent 
For aiding soul-development. 

No ! This other, on returning 
Homeward, prize in hand. 

Satisfied his bosom's yearning : 

(Sir, I hope you understand !) 
— Said " Some record there must be 

Of this cricket's help to me ! " 

So, he made himself a statue : 
Marble stood, life-size ; 



A TALE. 73 

On the lyre, he pointed at you, 

Perched his partner in the prize ; 
Never more apart you found 
Her, he throned, from him, she crowned. 

That's the tale : its application ? 

Somebody 1 know 
Hopes one day for reputation 

Through his poetry that's — Oh, 
All so learned and so wise 
And deserving of a prize ! 

If he gains one, will some ticket. 

When his statue's built, 
Tell the gazer " 'Twas a cricket 

Helped my crippled lyre, whose lilt 
Sweet and low, when strength usurped 
Softness' place i' the scale, she chirped ? 

" For as victory was nighest. 

While I sang and played, — 
With my lyre at lowest, highest. 

Right alike, — one string that made 
' Love ' sound soft was snapt in twain, 
Never to be heard again, — 

" Had not a kind cricket fluttered. 

Perched upon the place 
Vacant left, and duly uttered 

* Love, Love, Love,' whene'er the bass 



74 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Asked the treble to atone 

For its somewhat sombre drone." 

But you don't know music ! Wherefore 

Keep on casting pearls 
To a — poet ? All I care for 

Is — to tell him that a girl's 
" Love " comes aptly in when gruff 
Grows his singing. (There, enough !) 




HAIK, SUCH A WOXDEK OF FLIX AND FLOSS. 



GOLD IIAUi. 75 



GOLD HAIR. 



Oh, the beautiful girl, too white, 

Who lived at Pornic, down by the sea, 

Just where the sea and the Loire unite ! 
And a boasted name in Brittany 

She bore, which I will not write. 

Too white, for the flower of life is red : 
Her flesh was the soft seraphic screen 

Of a soul that is meant (her parents said) 
To just see earth, and hardly be seen, 

And blossom in heaven instead. 

Yet earth saw one thing, one how fair ! 

One grace that grew to its full on earth : 
Smiles might be sparse on her cheek so spare. 

And her waist want half a girdle's girth, 
But she had her great gold hair. 

Hair, such a wonder of flix and floss, 

Freshness and fragrance — floods of it, too ! 

Gold, did I say ? Nay, gold's mere dross : 

Here, Life smiled, " Think what I meant to do ! " 

And Love sighed, " Fancy my loss ! " 

So, when she died, it was scarce more strange 
Than that, when delicate evening dies, 



76 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

And you follow its spent sun's pallid range, 

There's a shoot of colour startles the skies 
With sudden, violent change, — 

That, while the breath was nearly to seek. 
As they put the little cross to her lips. 

She changed ; a spot came out on her cheek, 
A spark from her eye in mid-eclipse. 

And she broke forth, " I must speak ! " 

" Not my hair ! " made the girl her moan — 

" All the rest is gone or to go ; 
But the last, last grace, my all, my own. 

Let it stay in the grave, that the ghosts may 
know ! 
Leave my poor gold hair alone ! " 

The passion thus vented, dead lay she ; 

Her parents sobbed their worst on that ; 
All friends joined in, nor observed degree : 

For indeed the hair was to wonder at. 
As it spread — not flowing free, 

But curled around her brow, like a crown, 
And coiled beside her cheeks, like a cap. 

And calmed about her neck — ay, down 
To her breast, pressed flat, without a gap 

I' the gold, it reached her gown. 



GOLD HAIR. 77 

All kissed that face, like a silver wedge 

'Mid the yellow wealth, nor disturbed its hair : 

E'en the priest allowed death's privilege, 
As he planted the crucifix with care 

On her breast, 'twixt edge and edge. 

And thus was she buried, inviolate 

Of body and soul, in the very space 
By the altar ; keeping saintly state 

In Pornic church, for her pride of race, 
Pure life and piteous fate. 

And in after-time would your fresh tear fall, 
Though your mouth might twitch with a dubi- 
ous smile. 

As they told you of gold, both robe and pall. 
How she prayed them leave it alone awhile. 

So it never was touched at all. 

Years flew ; this legend grew at last 
The life of the lady ; all she had done, 

All been, in the memoi^ies fading fast 
Of lover and friend, was summed in one 

Sentence survivors passed : 

To wit, she was meant for heaven, not earth; 

Had turned an angel before the time : 
Yet, since she was mortal, in such dearth 

Of frailty, all you could count a crime 
Was — she knew her gold hair's worth. 



78 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 



At little pleasant Pornic church, 

It chanced, the pavement wanted repair. 

Was taken to pieces : left in the lurch, 
A certain sacred space lay bare, 

And the boys began research. 

'Twas the space where our sires would lay a saint, 

A benefactor, — a bishop, suppose, 
A baron with armour-adornments quaint, 

Dame with chased ring and jewelled rose, 
Things sanctity saves from taint ; 

So we come to find them in after-days 

When the corpse is presumed to have done with 
gauds 

Of use to the living, in many ways : 

For the boys get pelf, and the town applauds. 

And the church deserves the praise. 

They grubbed with a will : and at length — cor 
Humanum, pectora cceca., and the rest ! — 

They found — no gaud they were prying for, 
No ring, no rose, but — who would have 
guessed ? — 

A double Louis-d'or ! 

Here was a case for the priest : he heard. 

Marked, inwardly digested, laid 
Finger on nose, smiled, " There's a bird 



GOLD HAIR. 79 

Chirps in my ear : " then, *' Bring a spade, 
Dig deeper ! " — he gave the word. 

And lo, when they came to the coffin-lid. 
Or rotten planks which composed it once, 

Why, there lay the girl's skull wedged amid 
A mint of money, it served for the nonce 

To hold in its hair-heaps hid ! 

Hid there ? Why ? Could the girl be wont 
(She the stainless soul) to treasure up 

Money, earth's trash and heaven's affront ? 
Had a spider found out the communion-cup. 

Was a toad in the christening-font ? 

Truth is truth : too true it was. 

Gold ! She hoarded and hugged it first. 
Longed for it, leaned o'er it, loved it — alas — 

Till the humour grew to a head and burst, 
And she cried, at the final pass, — 

" Talk not of God, my heart is stone ! 

Nor lover nor friend — be gold for both ! 
Gold I lack ; and, my all, my own, 

It shall hide in my hair. I scarce die loth 
If they let my hair alone ! " 

Louis-d'or, some six times five, 

And duly double, every piece. 
Now, do you see ? With the priest to shrive. 



80 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

With parents preventing her soul's release 
By kisses that kept alive, — 

With heaven's gold gates about to ope, 

With friends' praise, gold-like, lingering still. 

An instinct had bidden the girl's hand grope 
For gold, the true sort — " Gold in heaven, if 
you will ; 

But I keep earth's too, I hope." 

Enough ! The priest took the grave's grim yield : 
The parents, they eyed that price of sin 

As if thirty pieces lay revealed 
On the place to hury strangers in, 

The hideous Potter's Field. 

But the priest bethought him : " ' Milk that's spilt ' 
— You know the adage ! Watch and pray ! 

Saints tumble to earth with so slight a tilt ! 
It would build a new altar ; that, we may ! " 

And the altar therewith was built. 

Why I deliver this horrible verse ? 

As the text of a sermon, which now I preach : 
Evil or good may be better or worse 

In the human heart, but the mixture of each 
Is a marvel and a curse. 

The candid incline to surmise of late 

That the Christian faith proves false, I find ; 



GOLD HAIR. 81 

For our Essays-and-Reviews' debate 
Begins to tell on the public mind, 
And Colenso's words have weight : 

I still, to suppose it true, for my part, 
See reasons and reasons ; this, to begin : 

*Tis the faith that launched point-blank her dart 
At the head of a lie — taught Original Sin, 

The Corruption of Man's Heart. 



82 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 



DONALD. 

Do you happen to know in Ross-shire 

Mount Ben . . . but the name scarce mat- 
ters : 

Of the naked fact I am sure enough, 
Though I clothe it in rags and tatters. 

You may recognise Ben by description ; 

Behind him — a moor's immenseness : 
Up goes the middle mount of a range, 

Fringed with its firs in denseness. 

Rimming the edge, its fir-fringe, mind ! 

For an edge there is, though narrow ; 
From end to end of the range, a strip 

Of path runs straight as an arrow. 

And the mountaineer who takes that path 

Saves himself miles of journey 
He has to plod if he crosses the moor 

Through heather, peat,, and burnie. 

But a mountaineer he needs must be. 
For, look you, right in the middle 

Projects bluff Ben — with an end in ich — 
Why planted there, is a riddle : 



DONALD. 83 

Since all Ben's brothers little and big 
Keep rank, set shoulder to shoulder, 

And only this burliest out must bulge 
Till it seems — to the beholder 

From down in the gully, — as if Ben's breast, 

To a sudden spike diminished. 
Would signify to the boldest foot 

" All further passage finished ! " 

Yet the mountaineer who sidles on 

And on to the very bending. 
Discovers, if heart and brain be proof, 

No necessary ending. 

Foot up, foot down, to the turn abrupt 

Having trod, he, there arriving, 
Finds — what he took for a point was breadth, 

A mercy of Nature's contriving. 

So, he rounds what, when 'tis reached, proves 
straight. 

From one side gains the other : 
The wee path widens — resume the march. 

And he foils you, Ben my brother ! 

But Donald — (that name, I hope, will do) — 

I wrong him if I call " foiling " 
The tramp of the callant, whistling the while 

As blithe as our kettle's boilinff. 



84 THE BOYS' BBOWNING. 

He had dared the danger from boyhood up, 
And now, — when perchance wag waiting 

A lass at the brig below, — 'twixt mount 
And moor would he standing debating ? 

Moreover this Donald was twenty-five, 

A glory of bone and muscle : 
Did a fiend dispute the right of way, 

Donald would try a tussle. 

Lightsomely marched he out of the broad 
On to the narrow and narrow ; 

A step more, rounding the angular rock, 
Reached the front straight as an arrow. 

He stepped it, safe on the ledge he stood, 
When — whom found he full-facing ? 

What fellow in courage and wariness too, 
Had scouted ignoble pacing, 

And left low safety to timid mates. 
And made for the dread dear danger, 

And gained the height where — who could 
guess 
He would meet with a rival ranger ? 

'Twas a gold-red stag that stood and stared. 

Gigantic and magnific, 
By the wonder — ay, and the peril — struck 

Intelligent and pacific : 



DONALD. 85 

For a red deer is no fallow deer 

Grown cowardly through park-feeding ; 

He batters you like a thunderbolt 
If you brave his haunts unheeding. 

I doubt he could hardly perform volte-face 

Had valour advised discretion : 
You may walk on a rope, but to turn on a rope 
No Blondin makes profession. 

Yet Donald must turn, would pride permit, 

Though pride ill brooks retiring : 
Each eyed each — mute man, motionless beast — 

Less fearing than admiring. 

These are the moments when quite new sense. 

To meet some need as novel, 
Springs up in the brain : it inspired resource : 
— " Nor advance nor retreat but — grovel ! " 

And slowly, surely, never a whit 

Relaxing the steady tension 
Of eye-stare which binds man to beast, — 

By an inch and inch declension, 

Sank Donald sidewise down and down : 

Till flat, breast upwards, lying 
At his six-foot length, no corpse more still, 

— " If he cross me ! The trick's worth 
trying." 



86 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Minutes were an eternity ; 

But a new sense was created 
In the stag's brain too ; he resolves ! Slow, 
sure, 

With eye-stare unabated, 

Feelingly he extends a foot 

Which tastes the way ere it touches 

Earth's solid and just escapes man's soft, 
Nor hold of the same unclutches 

Till its fellow foot, light as a feather whisk. 

Lands itself no less finely : 
So a mother removes a fly from the face 

Of her babe asleep supinely. 

And now 'tis the haunch and hind-foot's turn 
— That's hard : can the beast quite raise it ? 

Yes, traversing half the prostrate length. 
His hoof-tip does not graze it. 

Just one more lift ! But Donald, you see. 

Was sportsman first, man after : 
A fancy lightened his caution through, 
— He wellnigh broke into laughter : 

" It were nothing short of a miracle ! 
Unrivalled, unexampled — 
All sporting feats with this feat matched 
Were down and dead and trampled ! " 



DONALD. 87 

The last of the legs as tenderly 

Follows the rest : or never 
Or now is the time ! His knife in reach, 

And his right hand loose — how clever ! 

For this can stab up the stomach's soft, 
While the left hand grasps the pastern. 

A rise on the elbow, and — now's the time 
Or never : this turn's the last turn ! 

I shall dare to place myself by God 

Who scanned — for he does — each feature 

Of the face thrown up in appeal to him 
By the agonising creature. 

Nay, I hear plain words : '' Thy gift brings 
this ! " 

Up he sprang, back he staggered. 
Over he fell, and with him our friend 

— At following game no laggard. 

Yet he was not dead when they picked next 
day 

From the gully's depth the wreck of him ; 
His fall had been stayed by the stag beneath 
Who cushioned and saved the neck of him. 

But the rest of his body — why, doctors said, 
Whatever could break was broken ,* 



88 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Legs, arms, ribs, all of him looked like a toast 
In a tumbler of port wine soaken. 

" That your life is left you, thank the stag ! " 
Said they when — the slow cure ended — 
They opened the hospital door, and thence 
— Strapped, spliced, main fractures mended, 

And minor damage left wisely alone, — 
Like an old shoe clouted and cobbled. 

Out — what went in a Goliath wellnigh, — 
Some half of a David hobbled. 

" You must ask an alms from house to house : 
Sell the stag's head for a bracket, 
With its grand twelve tines — I'd buy it myself - 
And use the skin for a jacket ! " 

He was wiser, made both head and hide 
His win-penny : hands and knees on. 

Would manage to crawl — poor crab — by 
the roads 
In the misty stalking season. 

And if he discovered a bothy like this. 
Why, harvest was sure : folk listened. 

He told his tale to the lovers of Sport : 

Lips twitched, cheeks glowed, eyes glistened. 



DONALD. 89 

And when he had come to the close, and spread 

His spoils for the gazers' wonder, 
With " Gentlemen, here's the skull of the stag 

I was over, thank God, not under ! " — 

The company broke out in applause ; 

" By Jingo, a lucky cripple ! 
Have a munch of grouse and a hunk of bread. 

And a tug, besides, at our tipple ! " 

And " There's my pay for your pluck ! " 
cried This, 

" And mine for your jolly story ! " 
Cried That, while T'other — but he was drunk — 

Hiccupped " A trump, a Tory ! " 

I hope I gave twice as much as the rest ; 

For, as Homer would say, '' within grate 
Though teeth kept tongue," my whole soul 
growled, 

" Rightly rewarded, — Ingrate ! " 



90 THE BOYS' BBOWNING. 



THE GLOVE. 

(PETER RONSARD loquitUV.') 

" Heigho," yawned one day King Francis, 

" Distance all value enhances ! 

When a man's busy, why, leisure 

Strikes him as wonderful pleasure : 

'Faith, and at leisure once is he ? 

Straightway he wants to be busy. 

Here we've got peace ; and aghast I'm 

Caught thinking war the true pastime. 

Is there a reason in metre ? 

Give us your speech, master Peter ! " 

I who, if mortal dare say so, 

Ne'er am at a loss with my Naso, 

" Sire," I replied, " joys prove cloudlets : 

Men are the merest Ixions " — 

Here the King whistled aloud, '' Let's 

— Heigho — go look at our lions ! " 

Such are the sorrowful chances 

If you talk fine to King Francis. 

And so, to the courtyard proceeding 
Our company, Francis was leading. 
Increased by new followers tenfold 
Before he arrived at the penfold ; 



THE GLOVE. 91 

Lords, ladies, like clouds which bedizen 

At sunset the western horizon. 

And Sir De Lorge pressed 'mid the foremost 

With the dame he professed to adore most. 

Oh, what a face ! One by fits eyed 

Her, and the horrible pitside ; 

For the penfold surrounded a hollow 

Which led where the eye scarce dared follow, 

And shelved to the chamber secluded 

Where Bluebeard, the great lion, brooded. 

The King hailed his keeper, an Arab 

As glossy and black as a scarab, 

And bade him make sport and at once stir 

Up and out of his den the old monster. 

They opened a hole in the wire-work 

Across it, and dropped there a firework, 

And fled : one's heart's beating redoubled ; 

A pause, wdiile the pit's mouth was troubled, 

The blackness and silence so utter. 

By the firework's slow sparkling and sputter ; 

Then earth in a sudden contortion 

Gave out to our gaze her abortion. 

Such a brute ! Were I friend Clement Marot 

(Whose experience of nature's but narrow. 

And whose faculties move in no small mist 

When he versifies David the Psalmist) 

I should study that brute to describe you 

llhvm Juda Leonem de Trihu. 



92 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

One's whole blood grew curdling and creepy 

To see the black mane, vast and heapy, 

The tail in the air stiff and straining, 

The wide eyes, nor waxing nor waning, 

As over the barrier which bounded 

His platform, and us who surrounded 

The barrier, they reached and they rested 

On space that might stand him in best stead : 

For who knew, he thought, what the amazement, 

The eruption of clatter and blaze meant, 

And if, in this minute of wonder. 

No outlet, 'mid lightning and thunder. 

Lay broad, and, his shackles all shivered, 

The lion at last was delivered ? 

Ay, that was the open sky o'erhead ! 

And you saw by the flash on his forehead. 

By the hope in those eyes wide and steady. 

He was leagues in the desert already. 

Driving the flocks up the mountain. 

Or catlike couched hard by the fountain 

To waylay the date-gathering negress : 

So guarded he entrance or egress. 

" How he stands ! " quoth the King : " we may 

well ^wear, 
(No novice, we've won our spurs elsewhere 
And so can afford the confession,) 
We exercise wholesome discretion 
In keeping aloof from his threshold. 
Once hold you, those jaws want no fresh hold, 



THE GLOVE. 93 

Their first would too pleasantly purloin 
The visitor's brisket or sirloin : 
But who's he would prove so foolhardy ? 
Not the best man of Marignan, pardie ! " 

The sentence no sooner was uttered, 
Than over the rails a glove fluttered, 
Fell close to the lion, and rested : 
The dame 'twas, who flung it and jested 
With life so, De Lorge had been wooing 
For months past ; he sat there pursuing 
His suit, weighing out with nonchalance 
Fine speeches like gold from a balance. 

Sound the trumpet, no true knight's a tarrier ! 
De Lorge made one leap at the barrier. 
Walked straight to the glove, — while the lion 
Ne'er moved, kept his far-reaching eye on 
The palm-tree-edged desert-spring's sapphire. 
And the musky oiled skin of the Kaffir, — 
Picked it up, and as calmly retreated. 
Leaped back where the lady was seated, 
And full in the face of its owner 
Flung the glove. 

" Your heart's queen, you dethrone her ? 
So should I ! " — cried the King — " 'twas 

mere vanity. 
Not love, set that task to humanity ! " 



94 THE BOYS' BROWNING. 

Lords and ladies alike turned with loathing 
From such a proved wolf in sheep's clothing. 

Not so, I ; for I caught an expression 

In her brow's undisturbed self-possession 

Amid the Court's scoffing and merriment, — 

As if from no pleasing experiment 

She rose, yet of pain not much heedful 

So long as the process was needful, — 

As if she had tried in a crucible. 

To what " speeches like gold " were reducible. 

And, finding the finest prove copper, 

Felt the smoke in her face was but proper ; 

To know what she had 7iot to trust to, 

Was worth all the ashes and dust too. 

She went out 'mid hooting and laughter ; 

Clement Marot stayed ; I followed after. 

And asked, as a grace, what it all meant ? 

If she wished not the rash deed's recaFment? 

" For I " — so I spoke — " am a poet : 

Human nature, — behooves that I know it ! " 

She told me, " Too long had I heard 
Of the deed proved alone by the word : 
For my love — what De Lorge would not 

dare ! 
With my scorn — what De Lorge could com- 
pare! 
And the endless descriptions of de^th 




"AND FULL TX THE FACE OF FrS OWNKK FHXC THE 

GLOVE." 



THE GLOVE. 95 

He would brave when my lip formed a breath, 

I must reckon as braved, or, of course. 

Doubt his word — and moreover, perforce. 

For such gifts as no lady could spurn. 

Must offer my love in return. 

When I looked on your lion, it brought 

All the dangers at once to my thought. 

Encountered by all sorts of men. 

Before he was lodged in his den, — 

From the poor slave whose club or bare hands 

Dug the trap, set the snare on the sands, 

With no King and no Court to applaud, 

By no shame, should he shrink, overawed. 

Yet to capture the creature made shift. 

That his rude boys might laugh at the gift, 

— To the page who last leaped o'er the fence 

Of the pit, on no greater pretence 

Than to get back the bonnet he dropped. 

Lest his pay for a week should be stopped. 

So, wiser I judged it to make 

One trial what ' death for my sake' 

Really meant, while the power was yet mine. 

Than to wait until time should define 

Such a phrase not so simply as I, 

Who took it to mean just ' to die.' 

The blow a glove gives is but weak : 

Does the mark yet discolour my cheek ? 

But when the heart suffers a blow. 

Will the pain pass so soon, do you know ?" 



9G THE BOYS' BBonnsiiJsrG. 

I looked, as away she was sweeping, 

And saw a youth eagerly keeping 

As close as he dared to the doorway. 

No doubt that a noble should more weigh 

His life than befits a plebeian ; 

And yet, had our brute been Nemean — 

(I judge by a certain calm fervour 

The youth stepped with, forward to serve her) 

— He'd have scarce thought you did him 

the worst turn 
If you whispered, " Friend, what you'd get, 

first earn ! " 
And when, shortly after, she carried 
Her shame from the Court, and they married, 
To that marriage some happiness, maugre 
The voice of the Court, 1 dared augur. 



THE END. 



JIJL 11 1899 



